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African American newborn.

Hey everyone,

Thanks for all of your great answers. A lot of you suggested foster care but first of all there are not very many infants in the foster care system. We are done with foster care in Maine, and we did have two great experiences adopting though the state of Maine. Someone wrote that a private adoption can cost around $4, ooo.oo.
Did you mean with the tax rebate? I know that a family can also apply for grants , but a person never knows how that will turn out. I don't know of any private agency that charges only $4,000.00 . Anyways thanks again for all the great answers.

Check with Catholic Charities. Our first adoption through them was only $5,000 plus the attorney. We'll probably never see the tax rebate b/c I gave up my job to stay home with her, so our income is too low (not fully refundable).

The reason our private infant domestic adoption would be between $5,000 and $2,500 is the way we choose to adopt. The organization we go through is not really an "agency." It only has two emplyees, operates on donations only, is a non profit, is located in the basement of a church (nice basement), and they do not advertise for expectant birthmothers. When they do actually do adoptions through them it is by word of mouth. They specialize in special needs and African-American/bi-racial adoptions. The lawyer that works with them does so by charging a flat rate and it is "reasonable" by most standards. In the end you pay for lawyer, home-study, and court fees. You may reimburse birthparents but that is included in the fees. I have a friend who adopted through them and they paid less than $3,000 in fees.

While they don't normally actually do adoptions (only occasionally by word of mouth) they do link perspective adoptive parents with adoption lawyers and agencies from all over this country. Agencies and lawyers call this organization and say they have an expectant woman or a woman who has already given birth but no one on their current client list desires to be matched to them. Meaning they have a butt load of white parents who want to wait for a Lilly white baby. People want to say that isn't true. Oh, it is true. So true that the average wait in this organization, from start to finish (finish being when baby comes home) is three to six months top. Our first DAY of being elligable to be matched we received five interested birthparents/situations. It was overwhelming.Â So that's how we did it.Â And we plan to go strictly through this organization the next time waiting for an "in house" referal.